


Sand Dunes

by jedicallie (writergirlie)



Series: Callista Returns series [6]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-28
Updated: 2010-04-28
Packaged: 2017-10-09 05:14:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/83408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writergirlie/pseuds/jedicallie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Luke always hated Tatooine but found himself drawn to his home planet time and time again. Now he sees it through the eyes of his daughter and realizes its place in his life. (AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sand Dunes

**Author's Note:**

> For Ash, who got me thinking of dad!Luke, an image that wouldn't let go until this got written. Thanks for the inspiration :).

Aunt Beru would have told him to be careful.

 

She would have made him hold her hand until they had reached the sand dunes—and even then, Luke knew that she probably wouldn’t have let go, instead tightening her grip all the more to ensure that he would stay close by her side at all times and not run away from her. It was, he’d since come to understand, probably her greatest fear: losing him. Having to let him go at some point. She must have known even then that it was only a matter of when, not if.

 

Though he knew that even at the tender age of four, his daughter had already inherited much of his recklessness, he let her break free from him when he felt her insistent tug, watched her run headlong into the wall of dust and sand, blond curls lifted by the gentle breeze and her shriek of giddy laughter carrying across and reaching him, the sweetest sound he had ever heard in his life. Her feet sank into the soft, unsteady ground with each step, yet it didn’t seem to slow her down for even a fraction of a second; when she finally reached her destination, she clamored up the smooth curve of one of the shallower dunes and stood atop the crest, triumphant, turning around to look at him and wave with a small, still chubby hand.

 

“Daddy!” she shouted, making the motion to jump up and down, but held back by the pull of the sand. “Look, I made it!”

 

Dust swirled around her; the wind had picked up. Luke shielded his eyes to look at her, but she didn’t seem to mind—or notice—the whirl of sand. Her peels of laughter grew only stronger, louder, and he couldn’t help but smile.

 

She was still so young, so little, yet she was already extraordinary beyond words.

 

“I found something! Over there, Daddy… Do you see it?”

 

She crouched down and reached out her hand when he approached, grabbing hold of his wrist and letting her fingers slide down into his palm, beaming widely when he closed his hand over hers and giving him a gentle, but firm pull, her other hand pointing to a gleam of white in the distance.

 

“That’s a krayt dragon, Cray.”

 

“A krayt dragon?”

 

“Mmm hmm. It died a long time ago. Those are its bones.”

 

“Can we go see it? Please, Daddy?”

 

He smiled, blinking back at the sand stinging his eyes. Before he could do something, though, she had already brought her hand up and to his surprise, made a quick swiping motion; the sand obeyed her command immediately and thinned, then blew away altogether.

 

“That’s better,” she said. “Come on, Daddy—race you!”

 

She slipped away from his grasp and tumbled down the sand dune, laughing as he gave chase and called after her with a playful growl. She was still panting when she’d reached the dragon’s skeleton, her gray eyes wide and taking in every detail of it as she traced the length of one of its ribs.

 

“But it’s so big!”

 

Luke let out a chuckle. “Bigger than the biggest bantha you could imagine.”

 

“Bigger than a bantha??”

 

“Yep.”

 

Her mouth formed a big “o.”

 

“Wow…”

 

Luke tapped on the dragon’s skull. “I got this close to one of these once,” he said. “Nearly got my head cracked open by the Sand People when I wasn’t paying attention.”

 

Cray looked up at him, her mouth falling open in silent terror.

 

“Don’t worry, baby, no Sand People around today. I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”

 

She smiled, then threaded her fingers through his. “I know, Daddy.”

 

She pulled him back towards the sand dune. He sank down onto the ground and pulled her onto his lap, letting brush her away the lock of hair that had fallen across his forehead and into his eyes. Beyond them, the suns were beginning to dip into the horizon, the sky bleeding apricot and lavender.

 

“Hey, do you want to see something pretty cool?”

 

She nodded enthusiastically.

 

“Take a look over there,” he said, pointing at the skyline, the same one he had gazed into more than two decades ago now, dreaming of a better life, a different life. Feeling that strange longing—the pull without a name. “That’s Tatoo I and Tatoo II.”

 

“The twin suns!”

 

“That’s right, Cray.”

 

After a while, he felt her sigh.

 

“It’s so pretty here,” she said. “Was it always this pretty?”

 

It was a question he wasn’t expecting, and one he thought for sure he’d have a ready answer for. Funny thing was, though, the answer that was on the tip of his tongue suddenly didn’t feel quite so right anymore.

 

“You want to know something? When I was a little boy, I never used to think it was all that pretty here.”

 

There was genuine surprise on her face. “Really?”

 

He nodded. “I used to think it was boring and ugly, and I dreamt all the time about leaving it—about going to some far off planet and finding adventure and meeting new and strange creatures… Silly, huh?”

 

She giggled, pushing back the curls that a new gust of wind had blown in her face.

 

“Silly…”

 

He looked back at the sinking suns again, marveling at how much had changed in the years in between: all the things he had seen and felt and experienced since then, the man he’d become and the boy he’d left behind in the sand dunes.

 

Callista and Cray and Ronan, and the new baby that was coming in just a few more months.

 

He smiled to himself. He hadn’t known it then, staring into the suns, what awaited him in the horizon. He got virtually nothing of what he had wished for, but everything he had no idea he’d always wanted.

 

“Do you still think it’s ugly, Daddy?”

 

He paused before answering her, then looked down at her and kissed her forehead.

 

“No, Cray,” he said. “I think… it’s beautiful.”


End file.
